Thorfinn is son to one of the Vikings’ greatest warriors, but when his father is killed in battle by the mercenary leader Askeladd, he swears to have his revenge. Thorfinn joins Askeladd’s band in order to challenge him to a duel, and ends up caught in the middle of a war for the crown of England.

Ever since Thorfinn became a slave, I've been looking forward to the moment his warrior spirit would reawaken. Now I guess it did happen, but alas, it's the 'no violence' kind. I face-palmed myself into oblivion. If this peaceful "I'm a true warrior who wont hurt anyone or I'll cry" shyte's gonna continue, I'm gonna flush this manga through the toilet. Figuratively. But absolutely.

There are already many well-written reviews here which explain in detail why Vinland is so darn awesome so I won't go into that....

I love Vinland Saga: the art, the plot, the characters...everything! Even though Vinland is at a slow point right now, Thorfinn is finally starting to develop into a coherent character and that is interesting enough! Plus there are implications of politics and plot development in the background, with the other characters from the previous arc exerting a subtle influence on the plot.

Being a total history dork, when I saw 'Vinland Saga' in my RSS feed, I kinda flipped. Started reading out of sheer curiosity, and totally fell in love.

First, it is incredibly historically accurate, even down to the helmets! No horned helmets here! The references to Norse folklore are fantabulous. The characters are wonderful and 3-D, and Thorfinn is a refreshing change from the usual shounen hero. Canute as well - his character has been fleshed out nicely. The gore is mostly kept to a tasteful level.

All in all? I'm addicted. Very few manga can keep me bouncing in my chair, eager for more, but this one does it. It's a shame this series is so underrated - won't stop me from cosplaying Thorfinn, though. =]

hmmm the story take a little slow.. i actually didn't wanted to read this manga at first and found out through desperation(couldn't find anything else to read) but after the boring intro..Everything change plot,emotion and epic scene finally brought me to like it. Like the way it represent the cruelty of humans

I anticipate upping my ranking to a ten by the finish of this one. Yet another manga for which I breathlessly await the next release.

I'm going through a Viking phase right now. So my preference for this manga is probably a little biased. I don't know much about the actual history of the Viking invasions of England, but the clothing, ships, housing, weapons, and details of day to day life have been rendered with fair accuracy in Vinland Saga.

The fighting, maybe a little over the top, yeah, especially the horse punching episode. Still, I didn't find the gore to be excessive. When I picked this book up my biggest worry was that it would be one long slaughterfest full of lovingly drawn images of blood pumping from cloven torsos. When it comes to Vikings, it's especially easy to glorify the violent aspects and gloss over the reality of such acts with a load of heroic pap. Vinland Saga doesn't do that. Many battles are portrayed as are heroic intentions. I think what balances it out is that all the battles arise out of strategic context, and motives from greed to stupidity to nation building, to ideology, to revenge are portrayed. The characters fight for good and bad reasons, and the characters are rounded enough so that you can really sympathize with their choices.

I've read a lot of shounen/seinen where the young warrior character gets idealized as some pinnacle of manhood and the reader gets a load of poorly supported philosophizing that comes across as justification for being a thoughtless brat who "solves" complex problems with violence. I also worried that Vinland Saga would follow this formula. Fortunately, this story is nothing like that. Yukimura Makoto philosophizes about war in a mature and complex way. He does not beat his reader with a moral hammer or dissolve into sentimentality. He is building a construct of a "true warrior," but he's been adding layers for 58 chapters now, I don't quite know where he's going with it, and I remain immensely engaged with his ideas.

There's also plenty of between battle content that fleshes out the political situation of the time as well as the various cultures of Iceland, Denmark, England, and Wales. Yukimura handles pacing fairly well, interspersing these scenes with the battles in a way that keeps the story flowing evenly. The plot moves along nicely but never feels so rushed that you can't take in the scenery.

I picked up Vinland Saga with a lot of reservations, all of which have proven baseless. This is a really engaging story, and I think it will appeal to more than just history nerds. Read it through that first long flashback and see if you can resist getting hooked.

This is probably the only series about Norsemen I could think of, and actually does them justice. And the war was depicted in full color, with no atrocities being spared, exaggerated just for the hell of it, or turned into a long moral lesson/tearjerker . Those proud warriors, who almost live exclusively for battle, valor and honor, and dream of being allowed by Odin into Valhalla after dying on the battlefield, so that they can continue to fight and party for eternity. It is a mindset that is almost incomprehensible to any of us today. It was a time full of endless battles, political scheming, genocides and terror, pure heroism, and stark beauty. This epic tale of a young fighter is but a single piece dedicated to those people. The artwork is excellent, the fighting scenes are fluid, distinguishable, detailed and original. This is more than anything I could ask for. This is something that I would really like to be turned into a movie. But alas, some manga series can never be showed on TV, 'won't someone please think of the children', Askeladd has without a doubt become my favorite character. Crowning moment of awesome.

Vinland Saga is a violent, meticulously orchestrated tapestry of characters that, it seems, is truly only beginning to flourish. At the time I began the manga, I could scarcely believe that someone who created Planetes could possibly produce something like this as well, but I'm quite glad I was proven wrong. Vinland Saga, although I truthfully can give no credence as to its historical accuracy, is one of the best-told period pieces out there, settling among the ranks of titles like [m]History[/m] and Cesare. I feel confidant that my opinion will only improve in the future.

I am a fan of history and historical stories and Vinland Saga is very very good. For a manga, which by nature has usually limited ability to round out characters, this one breaks that trope. I found the characters to be very 3-D in personality and the story flowed well. Of course some of the action scenes were a bit over the top, but not by too much, based on how battle was fought back then. For the people complaining about all the gore and blood, well what do you think a broad sword was for? It wasn't designed for fencing, it was to inflict the most damage in the quickest manner. Beheading, limbs and torsos hacked off and through really did happen. War and battle back then was a nasty brutish thing and a lot of blood was spilled.

Now I do doubt one man back then killed quite as many other men in one battle as some of the protagonists do in this story, but it's just a small exaggeration. Half the number was probably pretty accurate. So IMO, the battle scenes are relatively realistic.

Except for maybe, that horse getting punched out. Yeah... that was pretty funny!